The Best American Sports Writing was a yearly anthology of magazine articles on the subject of sports published in the United States. It started in 1991 as part of The Best American Series published by Houghton Mifflin and ceased publication in 2020. It was preceded by the Best American Sports Stories (1945–1991) and succeeded by The Year’s Best Sports Writing (2021–present), published by Triumph Books .
6-498: Articles were chosen using the same procedure as other titles in the Best American Series ; the series editor chose about 70–100 article candidates, from which the guest editor picked 25 or so for publication; many, but not all of the remaining runner-up articles were listed in the appendix. The series has been edited since its inception by Glenn Stout. Traditionally loaded with long-form feature stories and an occasional column,
12-924: Is best known for his lengthy human interest stories in Sports Illustrated , where he worked from 1983 to 2013. Smith worked as a sportswriter for the Wilmington News Journal , the Philadelphia Daily News , the New York Daily News , and Inside Sports before joining Sports Illustrated . His writing has also appeared in Time , Rolling Stone , and Esquire . For many years, Smith's role as senior writer at Sports Illustrated has been to write four lengthy feature articles per year, most of which are in-depth personality profiles. His wife, Sally, has described his motivation as follows: "He
18-521: Is not exclusively sports writing, such as Jeanne Marie Laskas whose 2008 piece "G-L-O-R-Y!" offered a rare look at professional cheerleaders. The series includes the Best American Sports Writing of the Century, published in 2000. The guest editor for that book was David Halberstam , who also served as the guest editor for the first edition of the series, in 1991. Selected from the cream of
24-486: Is not satisfied with putting facts together. He wants to understand what is the core conflict that has driven that person. He hopes to tell a secret that a person might not be aware of." Several of Smith's subjects have attested to his profound insight. Smith has received many awards and honors for his work at Sports Illustrated . He won the National Magazine Award for non-fiction , the magazine equivalent of
30-666: The annual book is considered a must-read by many sports writers, though the reach of its influence is debatable. Authors who have appeared in the series five or more times in its history are: Gary Smith (13 times), Wright Thompson (12), Steve Friedman (10), S.L. Price (nine), Charles P. Pierce (nine), William Nack (seven), Rick Reilly (seven), Roger Angell (seven), Pat Jordan (seven), Rick Telander (seven), Linda Robertson (six), Paul Solotaroff (six), Chris Jones (six), Chris Ballard (six), Mark Kram Jr. (five), Bill Plaschke (five), Peter Richmond (five) and Steve Rushin (five). It also includes award-winning writers whose genre
36-474: The sports journalism crop, nearly every guest editor has had at least one story published in a previous or later edition of the book. The only exceptions are John Feinstein , and Dick Schaap (whose work appeared twice in the Best American Sports Writing of the Century anthology). Gary Smith (sportswriter) Gary Smith (born October 27, 1953) is an American sportswriter . He
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